


Mourning Songs

by emblazonet



Series: a thousand years [1]
Category: Valdemar Series - Mercedes Lackey
Genre: Angst, Assassination Attempt(s), Assassination Plot(s), Bronze Age Valdemar, F/F, Intrigue, King Valdemar's Time, Wakes & Funerals, attempted coup
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-18
Updated: 2016-04-18
Packaged: 2018-06-03 02:38:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6593350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emblazonet/pseuds/emblazonet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Herald Yfandes and Herald Gala mourn the passing of King Valdemar, but there's no time for the new Order of Heralds to grieve—a riot indicates plots afoot. Soon they will be called on to save the life of Prince Restil to ensure Valdemar's survival.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mourning Songs

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was inspired by a random thought one day, while reading LHM—I wondered what Yfandes had been like as a Herald. When would she have served? Why not King Valdemar's time? 
> 
> I tried to make King Valdemar's time feel different and new, compared to the Valdemar we're used to reading about. Their magic is more advanced, but their metallurgy not so much. 
> 
> Many, many thanks to [Zahnie](http://archiveofourown.org/users/zahnie) ( go read her awesome Valdemar crossover fic [Safe Now](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2907782)!!) who encouraged me, edited the fic, who provided titles and also [this song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9ayN39xmsI) which is officially the Yfandes/Gala song (and not about Twilight).

The honour guard surrounded King Valdemar's coffin, guards and Heralds in their blue-and-silver, and around them like a black pond ebbed waves of mourners. Hundreds of them, thought Yfandes, as she wrapped her hands in Vulf's silvery mane. Almost as many people as lived in Haven, and more besides: landholders, settlers, soldiers, travelling players such as she had been before Vulf had come on bell-chime hooves to turn her life inside out. So many they seemed to fill the King's Park, that green semi-wilderness that surrounded the castle-keep on three sides and stretched down to the banks of the Haven River.

            Yfandes had felt all morning as if some magical knife has scraped out her innards and replaced them with stones. The air was thin and cold with the promise of autumn, the sky appropriately overcast. The wind stirred the blue linen drapes on the coffin, folding the fabric so that the embroidered crest of broken chains shifted like snakes. At the front of the procession, the priestess of Asterae lowered her arms. As one, the six pallbearers started forward: three guards and three Heralds on foot.

            Yfandes and Vulf, behind and to the right of the coffin in the mounted section of the honour guard, followed. Yfandes felt tears glide slowly down her cheek, but didn't wipe them. If the weak sunlight made them shine a little then the world would see how Heralds mourned their beloved king.

            Beside her, Galada leaned from her saddle to grasp Yfandes's hand. Yfandes could not bear to smile, but she took comfort in their contact and squeezed Gala's hand back. Gala's Companion Padetha pressed her nose against Vulf's. Step by slow step the Companions trod chimelessly in the wake of the coffin, twisting down the sinuous loops of the road. They would circle the city twice before they reached the great gate of Haven, and then to the rolling plains where the king's grave lay. Haven was a city built for defense and none of its roads were thoroughfares. Yfandes wanted to grip the coffin and hold it back: until it was lowered and buried, she could pretend this was all somehow a joke, that King Valdemar would sit up and overthrow the lid, and return to his rightful place on the throne.

            Ahead of her rode Prince Restil on Steladar. He looked back once during that long procession, his lips compressed. Like King Valdemar had been, Restil was white-skinned, but today he looked chalky and paler than ever. He had not been crowned yet, but Yfandes thought that he already felt the fillet on his head was too heavy. Queen Estella, who was a mage but not a Herald, rode a white palfrey beside her son, and she had covered her face and silver hair with an opaque black veil.

            No one was sure how it started, but as the huge procession wound down the hill, the voice of hundreds of women, starting from the outer edges of the mass of mourners, rose in an old hymn. It named many Gods, as King Valdemar had wished, though Yfandes knew that the song had started life in the Empire, where only one God had been named. Yfandes needed no prompting and she broke into song. She found herself unable to hit the highest notes: her throat was too closed, no matter how she tried to steady her breathing.

> _"...From farthest reach of sea and coast_

> _Where the grass grows high and the trees still taller_

> _I call you, come forth, I call you_

> _Send your blessings over the meadow,_

> _Send your blessings over the sea."_

            There was no sea, no ocean, in miles and miles. Yfandes barely knew what a sea was. King Valdemar had fled his coastal holdings with four hundred folk, and spent two and a half decades travelling to this land, the farthest North that anyone knew. But they carried the songs of their old home in the Empire and taught these songs to their children, and so Yfandes knew of the sea. Her mother and father, long dead, had sung such songs: and now Yfandes sang it at the funeral of yet another father, one she shared with these many hundreds of people.

            The women sang other songs, mourning songs. Gala's soft soprano lilted beside her. They did not let go of each other's hands. The men hummed, but did not sing, as was custom.

            Someday how many customs would there be in Valdemar? she wondered. "What will tie us together?" she asked Gala under the swell of women singing, as the procession passed under the arch of the thick palace wall. "With our king dead? He always said, 'there is no one true way', but how can that be if we are to be one people?"

            Gala looked at her. "Isn't that what Companions are for? And the Order of Heralds?"

            "I don't know what we are without a king," said Yfandes. She thought of long winter nights by the fire in the king's chambers. Heralds that were off-duty—usually only five or six—talked and talked long into the night over mugs of bitter spiced ale. She remembered King Valdemar holding her when her parents died, reassuring her that life would go on. He had held them all together. Perhaps Herald Beltran, the King's Own Herald, knew what insecurities Valdemar may have had, but to them all Valdemar had been their pillar, their strength.

            Yfandes felt a surge of love and solidity within her, a bulwark against despair: Vulf's reassurance. She wanted to throw her arms around his neck and hold him until her arms ached, but this wasn't the time. She squeezed Gala's hand tighter and sat straight. She was a daughter of Valdemar, as was Gala, as were the other singers, and she sang her grief to the sky. Clouds opened like a curtain to let sunlight fall over the procession as they exited the city.

            The barrows were a mile away, and the singing was sustained as they went. The crowd clustered around the pit where the body would be laid, and the barrow built over it. Guards rode thick-muscled horses up and down the lawn of the cemetery, forming the civilians into thick columns. "Get in line!" they called, not unkindly. Everyone would have their chance to throw dirt and small tokens into the grave. There were so many people that the professional gravediggers would find their work nearly done for them.

            King Valdemar's gravestone, which would be set atop the barrow, rose above the crowd: a black granite obelisk twice the height of a man, carved with the effigies of gods. It was decorated also with beaten copper and gold gilt, new and glinting in the sun, that formed stylized Companions that ran across the base. Yfandes watched as they lowered the coffin below it and bit down a sob.

            Maybe a thousand people were gathered that day. As the priests lined up to speak prayers, the dirt-throwing commenced. The Heralds would be the first; the guards would be the last. Yfandes dismounted and reached into the bowl offered by a boy of the court and scooped out a handful of dirt. With the dirt she threw down three gleaming pearls, treasures of the sea, heirlooms Yfandes's mother had given her. "I will miss you," she said solemnly, and then she stepped into the fold of the crowd.

            Separated from Vulf, she lost her Herald status: a man in a fur collar and bronze torc brushed past her with a half-snarled, "Out of my way, woman."

            "I'm a Herald," she snapped back.            

            "It's Heralds that destroyed our king!" shouted a voice from the crowd. Someone else took up the cry: "It's the Heralds that overworked our king! That poisoned our king with their strangeness!"

            The man with the bronze torc paused and pursed his lips. Yfandes recognized him before he plunged back into the crowd towards the coffin: Hearot, head of the Bronzeman's Guild. Shivers raced down her spine as she felt the crowd around her boil. Faces that had been slack in mourning became hard in anger. Bereft, they lashed out at the next available thing: her and others in blue and silver, Heralds and guards alike.            

            She breathed quickly as she brought up her weak magic shield just in time to ward a flung rock and the punch of a man in fine linen robes. She backed out of the crowd, looking left and right, dodging attacks, trying to flee. The songs had faltered and turned to screams of rage; Companions bugled and guards yelled for order, stabbing at the crowd with their bronze-tipped spears.            

            Her arms and legs tingled with the energy it took to maintain the shield. : _VULF_!: she yelled, trusting him to hear her through her mindspeech. : _Vulf_!:

            Lashing silver hooves struck the chest of a woman in a leather apron before her. The woman, whose fists had already cracked the skull of a man near Yfandes, fell like the dead, and then slowly curled up in pain. Vulf pushed through the crowd and held still as Yfandes heaved herself onto his back, fitting feet to stirrups. She gripped the saddlehorn tight as Vulf leapt higher than the crowd from a standstill, landing a foot away on the clear grass. He cantered to a safe distance and paced restlessly at the edges of the crowd while Yfandes dropped first her magical shield and then her mental ones.

            She took a deep breath, as if readying her lungs to scream, and slammed her mindvoice into the heads of everyone in a mile's radius. :HALT. BE AT PEACE. IS THIS HOW YOU MOURN YOUR KING?:

            Guards had split up clumps of rioters and caged them with their spears or their horses; Gala had tossed rioters aside with shoves of what was, Yfandes guessed, sheer magical power. All the Heralds were mounted now, and Companions used their big bodies for crowd control.

            At Yfandes's voice—her mindspeech gift was so strong even ungifted could hear her—much of the crowd stilled. Those who still fought were easily brought down by guards who abandoned lethal spears for swift incapacitating blows from hands, elbows, knees and feet.

            Yfandes and Vulf cantered towards the coffin to regroup with the other Heralds. Prince Restil sat straight on Steladar, the wind riffling both his long black hair and Steladar's coarser mane and tail. Tears glistened on Restil's face. He looked as if some sculptor inspired by his king's death had carved a face to encapsulate all there was of grief and despair.

 

* * *

 

"But you saw Korwynnel?" asked Gala as they climbed the stairs to the Heralds' Meeting Room. A restless night and a work-filled morning had not served to calm Yfandes's nerves after the riot.

            "No," said Yfandes, "I'm sorry, but I didn't. I didn't even know he was at the funeral—"

            "I'm not sure how you missed him," said Herald Beltran at the top of the stairs. He offered his arm to Gala, who took it. "Decked out in ornamental black leather and silver filigree, like a king himself. And bearing a mask of remorse one lip-twitch away from a sneer."

            "I saw Hearot, Head of the Bronzeman's Guild," said Yfandes, "and it was my retort to him that started the riot. I should have been more circumspect, King's Own, and for that I apologize." The snake of guilt in her gut writhed.           

            "It was Korwynnel that was spreading rumours about how the Heralds forced the King to overwork, how they poisoned his tea, how they fatigued him and tricked him, how the Order of Heralds wants only to be a new Empire, a new oppressor," said Gala firmly as they entered the Meeting Room. "If you triggered the riot, then it was only because Korwynnel sowed the seeds."

            Inside the room, a thick complement of fifteen Heralds, out of the twenty-one in the Order, stood or sat with steaming mugs in hand. A tripod and cauldron of oil-stained copper in the hearth held the tea that smelled so rich and good.  Unpoisoned, thought Yfandes with a spark of rage. The Heralds would never have poisoned their king. Grief surged, making her eyes itch; she fought it down. She had cried at the funeral, and now there was work to be done.

            Prince Restil sat near the fire in one of the few mismatched chairs, this one with stuffing trailing from the cushion. He turned an empty ceramic mug around in his hands, around and around, unable to meet anyone's eyes. His coronation would happen in a week, and he had been very quiet since the funeral. Herald Urani, who had a touch of the rare empathy gift, stroked his arm.

            "I heard Korwynnel speaking slander as well," said elegant Herald Isaya. She stood when Beltran entered to kiss his cheek in greeting, and then to kiss Yfandes and Gala as well. "His Mage's Guild is firmly anti-Herald."

            "Politically, is he not allied with the Bronzeman's Guild?" asked Yfandes, "With Hearot?"

            "So I've heard," said Beltran while Isaya nodded. "But Hearot is only recently come to Haven. He spends much of his time overseeing the mines and trade. Spends a lot of time travelling through the Gates, come to think of it."

            "And the Gates are maintained by the Mage's Guild," pointed out Herald Urani. Voices lifted in agreement.

            "Plenty of time to hear the point of view of anti-Heralds," said Isaya. "Not a lot of time to see our work in person."

            Heralds did not take the permanent magical Gates if there was no need. At present six Heralds rode circuit. The Companions were extremely fast, being creatures of magic with access to the nodes, and not taking the Gates meant Heralds could attend to all the villages instead of simply checking on the established towns.

            Someday, King Valdemar had told them all, Heralds would act as lawkeepers in those villages, solving problems and disputes, trusted by the populace. In practice, a Herald brought news to the villages, and took news in return back to the capital, to be recorded by Beltran and his assistants. Sometimes, sometimes, Heralds solved problems if they could. Heralds on circuit also watched the borders, and rallied the guards in face of attacks by Pelagiris-creatures or wild mages or the fearsome Hawkfolk.

            "What we do is not enough," said Yfandes. All the faces turned to her, because she had broken a brief thoughtful silence. She sighed, looking at the faces of her family, her brothers and sisters who held the laws and hopes of Valdemar within them. "We need to gain more trust amongst the people of Valdemar. We can't let this slip through our fingers."

            Galada held Yfandes's hand briefly. "It's up to us to define the future now," she said.

            Prince Restil looked up at her, the blood draining from his face.

            "Precisely," said Beltran. "Korwynnel has done nothing against the law, so far. Spreading rumours, raising a dissenting voice—this is protected under the law King Valdemar left to us to uphold. We are idealists, here to build the kind of realm the Empire never could be. We can start by not walking the easy path of political lies and assassinations." His voice was firm, but tiredness ran under it. Beltran was older than King Valdemar had been, well into his seventies, and bone-thin. His silver hair fell past his shoulders, often caught in a simple white ribbon. Yfandes dreaded his death as much as she dreaded a future without her king.

            But Restil had been Chosen at the same time, she told herself. She should trust Steladar's Choice, despite the fear in Restil's rabbit-huge eyes now trained on Beltran. But even as she tried to bolster her spirits, Restil's spine straightened, and his lips firmed. Yfandes sighed, leaning back against the doorframe. A younger Herald pushed a mug of tea in her hands.

            "We know what not to do," said Restil, instantly commanding everyone's attention. Like Yfandes, they all looked to Restil to fill the place of his father. "What is it that we should do?"

            "We need to increase our presence," said the young Herald who had given Yfandes tea. Anita, that was her name. "Even though there aren't many of us, we need to go among the people more. We need to help."

            "And how do we do that, with only twenty-one Heralds to cover so much space?" demanded Herald Garet.

            "There are four Companions who have not Chosen..." muttered Anita.

            "We can't force a Companion's Choice!" said Gala.

            "I wish we could talk with the Companions," said Herald Isaya.          

            "We can!" said Herald Urani.

            Isaya spread her hands. "We speak to them. They act as if they understand us, and they send us emotions—perhaps that's as good for you as speech is for us non-Empathetic folk, Urani—and they help the mages with their magic, and they are fast and... symbolic. We all have memories of them speaking ritual words to us at Choosing. But to converse with them, as if they were another Herald? They could advise us, I have no doubt. At the very least, they could tell us if more Heralds will be Chosen soon!"

            : _Vulf?_ : asked Yfandes, reaching through her connection to him. She felt his attention, his strength. Yfandes was the strongest mind-speaker amongst the Heralds. : _Can you speak? You're following this conversation, aren't you?_ : This was not the first time she had tried to coax him to speech. As before, she felt him send love and that familiar feeling of strength and assurance. But no words. : _Please?_ : she asked, and his response was a sense of firmness.

            Either he could and wouldn't, or he couldn't at all. She didn't know which. The degree of sentience Companions had was an oft-discussed mystery. But practically, right now, the Heralds would have to think their way out of this without strategic input from their spirit-partners.

            A few different conversations had broken out, filling the room with noise as the Heralds lifted their voices to be heard. Yfandes found herself unable to track any of the conversations. This was just as well: from her place by the door, she was able to hear the rapid, frantic knocking on the other side.

            She pulled upon the door, nudging Gala aside. A page stood there, his hair damp with sweat. His faded blue uniform was askew. "Fire!" he yelled, his just-breaking voice powerless to command the room. He looked up at Yfandes desperately. "There's fire in the city! There's a riot!"

            Another one? Swiftly Yfandes repeated his words in loud Mindspeech. To her brief pleasure, Restil was the first to rise. As before, all the Heralds turned to him.

            "Garet, Devonal, Andy—alert the guard and take command as needed. Beltran, you and Isaya and—Anita, you've a good head on your shoulders—stay here and ready the palace for the injured. Sorca, you find every healer you can, you hear? Yfandes, Gala—you're with the mages. Roget, you are a fire-mage. Go with Garet and tame the fire."

            If Restil ordered ought else, Yfandes could not hear it. She and Gala pelted from the room.                

            By the time they'd raced down the spiral staircases and out the door that led to the Companions's Stable, Vulf and Padetha were waiting, already tacked up in basic gear. Once Yfandes was in the saddle, she could see the low blister of fire in the city. Vulf shot like an arrow from a bow, down into the city, Padetha matching him stride-by-stride.

            "Will you be all right?" shouted Gala. She meant: was Yfandes's paltry magical gift up to the rigours of whatever was necessary.

            "I'll be fine," said Yfandes. "I'll do anything physical—you can take my magic if you need it."

            They'd done a ritual for that, to open a channel between Gala and Yfandes, since Yfandes's energy was so weak. But it meshed well with Gala's magic, and bolstered it and made it stronger.  They were a good team. Yfandes looked at Gala, at the fireglare of the city casting ominous shadows on her bronze hair and lined face.

            : _Keep safe,_ : she added, mind-to-mind. Gala had no mindspeech talent to speak of, but through their connection Yfandes felt her love and gratitude.

            Their ride through the city was hellish but brief. The Companions took the least-populated route to the building that housed the Mage's Guild, skirting both the roaring crowds and leaping flames. There was a courtyard with some trees and a well in front of the the three-storey guild building. Mage-constructs drew water from the well, and a line of mages, apprentices and townsfolk passed the gleaming conjured buckets along down the streets and alleys towards the nearest fire.

            A tall woman broke away from other three mages who supervised both constructs and the firefighters. She was imperious, her dramatically-cut robes unsmutched by soot or ash, not a hair of her severe bun out of place. She looked at Gala and Yfandes and said, as if she spoke to a beggar or errant servant, "Heralds. We have no need of your services."

            "Pardon me, Guildlady," said Gala, putting a hand briefly over her heart in greeting, "I am a mage and this is my partner. We are here to help."

            "We have all things under control," said the Guild mage. "Our constructs are untiring, and this fire brigade here has everything under control. My... thanks... for you offer of help. It is not needed." She turned and returned to the well. The air was tight and dizzying with such strong magics in place, but neither mages nor firefighters seemed to notice. Sweat beaded most peoples' foreheads.

            Yfandes and Gala exchanged glances. Padetha snorted and pawed at the dirt, then flicked her tail and back up two short steps. Vulf threw his head around to look back towards the castle. Before Gala and Yfandes had discussed any direction, the Companions flung themselves around and trotted away from the guild.

            The Companions brought them to the wall around the castle, where Restil and the other Herald-Mages stared at the flaming city. The more powerful mages stood still in trance as they did their workings. Two younger Herald-Mages had cleared a space on the wall, and on a little stool they had laid out a grid of crystals and powder, over which they muttered chants. As Gala and Yfandes dismounted and joined their fellows, large flames vanished from the roofs of buildings, snuffed by magic.

            Gala sat down beneath the crenellations, her back against the wall. She brought out her focus-stone, a tourmaline chunk with one clear squarish crystal rising from the bed. She held it in her hands, and Yfandes sat opposite her, cupping Gala's hands with her own. She could feel the magical pulse of the tourmaline. Yfandes closed her eyes and breathed in time with Gala.

            Yfandes let down her shields and felt Gala weave her magic around Gala's own spells. She could sort of see Gala's spellworking, in flashes of images that came to her: ash-covered streets; the beams of new houses falling inwards as fire ate them; a mother scooping up a child as Gala held the flames away from her, allowing her to escape. This was the house Gala focussed on. In bits and pieces Yfandes became aware of its immensity: it had three floors and an attic, room for grandparents and cousins to stay, a nursery with a beautiful rocking-horse painted white, everything nibbled at by angry red flames.

            Nets of magic wrapped around the fire, somehow, from root-cellar to attic, and Gala pulled. Yfandes, through their connection, pulled too, heaving, like horses in harness at plowing-time. Flames licked their way out of the net, but the net was Gala's magic, and she was not yet tired. She yanked and she yanked, and pulled the energy of the fire into her tourmaline.

            Into the tourmaline? : _Gala, what are you—_ :

            Yfandes had enough warning. She opened her eyes with a start and knocked the tourmaline from Gala's hands. It exploded as it hit the stone of the wall, leaving only a scorchmark behind. Fortunately it was a small explosion, and it hurt no one. None of the other mages looked up.

            "What possessed you?" Yfandes yelled before Gala had properly emerged from her trance.

            "It was the most efficient way to contain and destroy the fire I could think of," Gala said. "I thought you trusted my judgement in magic?"

            "I do— I just—if that had exploded over our hands, we might not have hands anymore," said Yfandes. And the tourmaline had been her gift to Gala, and she felt unnecessarily sentimental. But she wouldn't tell Gala that.

            "I trusted you to watch me," said Gala seriously, finally opening her eyes. Yfandes always had admired her long, long lashes.

            She leaned over and kissed Gala briefly. "I'm sorry I yelled at you. You scared me."

            Gala pressed her cheek to Yfandes' briefly, before rising unsteadily to her feet. She leaned on the crenellations and looked out over the city. Most of the flames were gone. There was no sign of the riot, but guards in blue were all over the streets, many with rope-bound prisoners. Instigators.

            The city was a half-charred wreck, and Yfandes could well guess how ugly it would be in the morning.

            "Interesting," said Gala as the other mages shook off their trance. She looked at Restil, who looked haunted and miserable. "We did not see Korwynnel at the Mage's Guild."

            "They refused your help?" he asked.

            "Naturally," said Yfandes, shaking her head.

            Restil frowned. "I don't like this at all," he muttered.

            Gala and Yfandes leaned on each other, gazing tiredly at their prince. "No," said Gala slowly, and Yfandes echoed her, "neither do we."

 

* * *

 

Fires did not break out in the city again, and riots were fewer and limited to the alehouses. Still the city simmered with unrest. The coronation was still a week away: Restil, by custom, would mourn for a full two weeks. "I would have advised three for Restil, if Valdemar were a stable country," Beltran had commented one evening, shaking his head.

            It had been a busy week for Heralds in the wake of the riot. Trials were held every day for instigators and dissenters, and though the sentences passed tended to be light—ten stripes, given publically; fines; incarceration for several days or, once, a full week—Heralds were present at each trial, casting truth spells until their limbs nearly gave out. The point was to show the populace two things: that the Heralds were stern and dedicated to keeping Valdemar's land together, and that they were more just than ever the Empire had been. Everyone with a grievance or a comment or a worry was heard.

            "If I have to stand for six candlemarks without eating one more time—" Yfandes groaned as she lay back on her bed. The small, white-washed room was a cool oasis in a city of endless work.

            "I know," agreed Gala with a matching groan. "I am so bored with it all I could scream."

            "I'd take you dancing if I had the energy," Yfandes said, apologetically. They usually tried to go to a rotating selection of dancing-nights in the city once a week. Yfandes wasn't much of a dancer, but her skills as a singer and flautist were often in demand.

            "I'll live," said Gala. "Besides, my feet hurt too much. Though what's the point of living if you can't dance?" She flung an arm dramatically over her forehead and mock-swooned on the bed beside Yfandes.

            "Not sure," said Yfandes, wrapping an arm tight around her. She propped herself up on her elbow, enjoying the feel of Gala's slender body warm against hers. She pressed a kiss to Gala's cheek, and Gala turned her face to make it a deeper, much more interesting kiss.

            Gala trailed her fingers along Yfandes's shoulder. "It's been so long since we've had time together," she whispered.

            "If you're too tired to go dancing..." Yfandes started.

            Gala kissed her quiet, and said, her breath faster and voice hoarser, "Don't you dare. I've missed you too much."

            "You've seen me in court—mmf!"

            Yfandes was just setting out to unlace Gala's shirt with her teeth when someone pounded on the door.

            Gala swore viciously and began to retie her laces. Yfandes climbed carefully over her and wrenched open the door. "What?" she demanded.

            The page, a very small girl, cringed. "Master of the Bronzeman's Guild wants Herald Yfandes. Are you Herald Yfandes?"

            "Master of the—" Yfandes took in a deep breath and forced herself to smile as kindly as she could. "I'm sorry if I frightened you. Just let me get my surcoat and I'll come along." On went the surcoat, and then her belt, and, as a precaution, she strapped on her long knife. Swiftly Gala donned the same, but she had her sword with her, and she clipped it to her belt.

            "He didn't say to bring another Herald," the page said cautiously, her big brown eyes very wide above a sprinkle of freckles.

                        "We come as a team," said Yfandes firmly, softening it with another smile. The page shrugged, looked more relaxed, and led them out of the room and towards the waiting room where Heralds ordinarily received visitors at the castle.

            Master Hearot was pacing when they entered. His crow's feet were deep and enhanced by the dark circles of sleepless nights. The skin at his neck was loose, its age-spots enhanced by the bronze torc of his profession. Yfandes wondered if he'd lost much weight lately, and realized she had not known he was so old.

            "By the Twins—and I thought it was you, from the funeral—Herald, it's starting now. There's an assassination, they're going to kill Prince Restil!"

            "Who?" demanded Yfandes. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Gala reach for her swordhilt.

            "Korwynnel and his allies. Of which I was, recently, one, but I hadn't known the severity of— his mages are in the palace now. There'll be rioting in the streets again, if it's not happening as we speak—I should have come sooner, but they've kept a watch on me—"

            Yfandes screamed warnings through her mindspeech, and Vulf's power coursed through her to amplify the warning. She felt every Herald in the palace respond, knew where each of them was. She felt Herald Devonal in the entrance hall die in the same instant as a mage battered him with lightnings. : _Restil_ ,: she called to where the prince stood frozen in the throne room, surrounded by Beltran and Isaya and a handful of guards. : _You need to run!:_

There were bells tolling, muffled shouting, and in her mind she could hear alarm screams. She felt shocked and gutted, just as she had when King Valdemar had died. But he had passed away peacefully, and Devonal's sudden extinguishing was something else again.

            "We have to get to Restil," Gala said. "I can feel the mages breaking into all the lower levels of the palace. They must have bribed the guards, there were traitors—"

            "Of course there were traitors," said Hearot bleakly.

            Yfandes wiped her tears with the back of her hand. There had been what, five guards with Restil? Any one of them could be a traitor, an anti-Herald, an Empire-loyalist, or—or—whatever it was that made these people hate King Valdemar so that they would rip his kingdom to shreds so soon after its infancy. She drew her dagger as Gala drew her sword, and then they raced through the door into the narrow hallways of the castle-keep.

            Like nearly everything in Haven, the keep was built to withstand invasion: the hallways were narrow and twisted, and there were no direct routes anywhere.  Stairwells curved upwards, and defenders who had the higher ground had the real advantage there. Assuming, of course, they could fend off the magic of Korwynnel's guild.

            The keep was built as a square around an inner courtyard. Restil was in the administrative wing, on the opposite side of the castle-keep from the bed-chambers. Yfandes and Gala were in the wing perpendicular to those. Through her wide-open link to all the Heralds, boosted and held by the magic of the Companions, Yfandes could feel Restil move from the throne room to the nearest stairwell up, to the floor full of offices. The fastest way to get to that floor was to go around the other direction, through the library and schooling wing, by a servant's stair.

                     Gala felt Yfandes's plan as Yfandes shoved it through her magic at her. There was no time to waste on words. As they ran for the servant's stair they turned a counter and saw guards fighting mages—losing to mages. The air stank of blood and lightning and charred flesh. Someone had started a fire, and the tapestries smouldered on the wall. Yfandes braced herself as Gala, taking advantage of the element of surprise, thrust a solid wall of power against the mages, knocking them aside. They tumbled to the ground, and Yfandes and Gala sped past the battle as the guards pressed their advantage. Steel would carve into flesh, but Yfandes didn't see it.

            The servant's stair was abandoned. They leaped two and three stairs at a time and pelted down the hall by the library. To their left, large windows looked over the inner courtyard. Yfandes glimpsed mage manifestations glimmering as they fought: a massive winged serpent twisted through the air to bite the neck of a red-streaked transparent bear. She had no notion whose manifestation was whose, but she knew through her magic that Herald-Mage Talek and the fire-caller Herald Roget fought there.

            They turned the corner and found themselves cut off from Restil by a four mages, one of whom was, Yfandes realized, Korwynnel. She had seen him only from afar, but his thick raven hair and shoulder-cap trimmed in red-dyed feathers were unmistakable. Yfandes skidded to a halt, and Gala dropped into a fighting crouch beside her.

            Isaya glittered from within a shield that stretched over Restil, Beltran, and two guards. The other three guards lay dead between Restil and the mages: one with a slit throat, the others covered in burn marks. Red and blue lightnings crackled against Isaya's shield, fizzling off it in angry sparks.

                   Any magic Beltran could work was something of carefully laid ritual. He held his sword with shaking hands and looked pitifully baffled. He was so old now. Restil did better, for he had inherited his father's mage-gift: he battered the mages with needles of bright light, which the mages were able to take turns deflecting. The guards stood behind the shield, fierce but injured, waiting for a good opening.

            Korwynnel did not bother turning to see Yfandes and Gala; he waved a hand and one of his mages, a young man with short-cropped brown hair and covered in gaudy links of bronze, turned and lobbed greenish fire at them.

            Yfandes and Gala reacted as one and threw up a combined shield. The fire drained away on impact.

            Yfandes reached with her mind and screamed : _STAND DOWN, MAGES_ :, hoping to startle them and distract them from Gala's imminent attack.

            Korwynnel laughed. When Gala threw her own lightnings at the mages, Korwynnel raised his hands, still not turning around. Energy surged all around, shaking the corridor, and magic blazed out of each of the mages with him. The light coalesced in front of Yfandes and Gala, and in another moment it turned into a pillar of roaring flames that leapt from floor to ceiling.

            The pillar grew legs and feet, and Yfandes' mouth went dry. A fire elemental, called from another plane—this was magic so far beyond her she barely knew anything about it, save what Gala and reading had told her.

            The heat nearly blistered their faces; they stumbled back. : _What do we do?_ : cried Yfandes. Gala was no match for a mage as strong and skilled as Korwynnel. Isaya and Restil had comparable power, but they were on the other side. Even with Yfandes, Vulf and Padetha to support her, Gala could not answer the elemental with one of her own.

            Yfandes felt Gala stand straighter, felt her determination. Gala caught Yfandes's hand, which did strengthen their connection: Yfandes spun away her power. Gala took threads of it to weave into her creation.

            Gala's parents had been weavers, Yfandes remembered suddenly, feeling Gala lay cords of magic down. 'Weaving' wasn't an uncommon metaphor for magic, but here it felt like truth. And when Gala was done she held out a blanket made of the winds, and threw it over the fire elemental.

            Yfandes, with the little of her power remaining to her, helped clamp the blanket down. The fire elemental thrashed as the blanket smothered it. Yfandes saw Korwynnel's mouth twist. Flames licked out in all directions, scorching wood, stone and tapestry. It burnt its way downward, turning the wooden floor to cinders. The elemental crashed down to the next floor. Gala and Yfandes held the blanket as long as they could, but the fire elemental was too strong. Flames roared along beneath them, but apparently a fire elemental could not fly; it remained below, roaring like a furnace. Yfandes, through Vulf, felt nearby Heralds run to fight it.

            Now a gaping hole separated Yfandes and Gala from Korwynnel and the two surviving mages. Of the dead, one mage was blackened and burnt from the elemental's proximity, though Yfandes did not know how it had happened. Another mage lay arms akimbo, a shining magic dart in his throat that faded away as she watched. Yfandes looked beyond her enemies to her prince, to Restil, whose face held only grim determination.

            Gala heaved in a breath and drew her sword. Yfandes didn't have time to react; Gala threw herself over the hole and slashed at Korwynnel. Her sword bounced off his magical shield with an ethereal ringing. The other mages closed in, though Gala shielded herself also, and fought for an opening. The lights of soap-bubble shields and glimmering spells would have been beautiful, almost, except for the corpses underfoot, and the danger of it all.

            Restil's guards closed in to help. One thought he had an opening but he met lighting instead, and went down. What happened to the next she didn't know, because she saw her own opening. Yfandes leapt the gap in the floor, grabbed the nearest mage, and plunged the dagger into her face.

            Yfandes was lucky; it entered the mage's eyes. She went down, and Yfandes let her, and found herself shoulder-to-shoulder with the last of Restil's guards. Isaya still held the barrier that protected Restil and Beltran, though she trembled with exertion. Her shield would not last much longer. Restil still flung light, but in intervals, and his face was pale.

            And now there was Korwynnel alone. How had the other mage died? There could have been blood on Gala's sword, Yfandes couldn't quite see because Gala stood in front of her, and anyway all the magic lights were making Yfandes dizzy. The lights; and the smell of blood, burning, and the freshly dead.            

            Yfandes said, "Gala," because she knew, _she knew_ , that this was the last time she'd ever say it so Gala could hear it. She knew because she saw Korwynnel smile, because she saw his arms lift, because she saw Gala's swing go wide, because when the red lightning came it obliterated sight and sense and reason.

            Every shield Yfandes had ever built in her mind dropped away. Grief—for Gala, for Valdemar, for Herald Devonal who had been the first of this coup's victims, for the guards that lay dead and the mages who could have been allies instead of enemies—all of it poured out of her. Isaya dropped her shield, weeping. Restil collapsed, and Beltran sobbed so hard it shook his body. The guard beside Yfandes fell to his knees.

            Korwynnel was a powerful mage, but he was human, and like most mages he did not understand the mind gifts. He fell backwards, stumbling against the wall.

            Yfandes saw her opening, and took it. She launched forward, snatched up Gala's sword, and thrust it into Korwynnel. She threw the entirely of her body weight into it; she felt the sword push through organs, past the spine, to stop at the stone wall behind. She was so close to Korwynnel she could see the mole on his left cheek, the hairs in his nose, the infinite blue of his murderous eyes.

            Raw power shoved her away, into the arms of the guard who caught her instinctively. But it was too late for Korwynnel, who gripped the hilt of the sword, but couldn't pull it out. Yfandes let the guard pull her up, and with a force of will she remained standing. But all she wanted to do was fall down beside Gala—lifeless, broken, no-longer-there Gala—and weep until she created a sea like a spirit from a song.

            "I love you," she whispered, over and over, as the guard brought her to Restil.

            "Yfandes," said Restil and Beltran together.

            "I love you," said Yfandes, one last time, before she took in a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and faced her prince who would soon be her king. "We need to go," she said.

            Somehow, somehow, she managed to walk on her own legs. Somehow, she escorted Restil safely to the Companion's Field. Somehow, Vulf found her. It was over.

 

* * *

 

The trials went on for the next forever, but some decrees King Restil—hastily crowned the day after the coup—made early on: there was to be no more Mage's Guild. Mages would register with the king, and practice their work licensed by the crown, or they would leave Valdemar entirely. There were executions of powerful mages, public ones, but most mages consented to heavy labour: digging graves, rebuilding the palace, mining.

            Yfandes attended none of the executions. She had already acted the executioner; she didn't want to see any more blood than she had to. She attended Herald Devonal's funeral, and after she, Beltran, Isaya and young Herald Anita dressed Gala's body and readied it for the next.

            Gala's funeral was a quiet thing, a small procession amongst small processions. They buried her in a mound near King Valdemar's, and Yfandes had no pearls to give her. Still, Yfandes lay Gala's sword—cleaned—in the grave, and little trinkets and baubles Gala had liked. Despite the dangers Heralds faced, Yfandes hadn't thought Gala would ever die. At least, not so soon. She thought they'd face a new future together, serve under their new king together.

            "Galada was..." Yfandes said to a crowd of mourners, Heralds mostly, in blue and silver and black, including King Restil. "Vibrant... and fun... kind...I..." Vague words. Stupid, stupid vague words. "I loved her utterly. She served Valdemar with loyalty, and integrity, and with a sense of spirit and determination that was... unique. Look, I... she could make a joke out of anything, she could turn any rough situation into an advantage. She loved dancing, and that's how she lived her life, like a dance, like a joy, because that's what she wanted for Valdemar. She used to tell King Valdemar jokes—oh hell, half of you remember that ongoing thing about the lark and soup pot, right?"

            Laughter. Yfandes found herself smiling for the first time in days, though there were tears in her eyes. Like a sunshower, she thought affectionately. Laughter like sunlight, tears like rain. She cut her speech relatively short after that, because there didn't seem to be much to say. She was full of feeling. How could she put over ten years of loving into one speech anyway?

            After, all that was what the wake was for.

            They held it in the Companion's Field, and the ale flowed freely. Dancing in honour of Gala felt right to Yfandes, although she played her flute instead of dancing. She would have sang, but her voice was thick with grief still. Companions danced too, graceful apparitions of flowing mane and tail, stamping hooves in tune and pacing, or rearing up a little, or giving tiny kicks.

            As the night went on, she found herself sitting on the grass overlooking the Haven River, with Restil beside her. She was more than a little tipsy. "She would have loved to serve under you, your majesty," she said.

            "You don't need to say that," muttered Restil.

            "That Gala loved you, or 'your majesty'?"

            "Restil is fine, 'Fandes, don't be ridiculous. You knew me before my beard grew."

            Yfandes snorted. Restil didn't wear a beard.

            "But I'm glad to know Gala approved," he added.

            "We were both nervous because you were so sad when your father died," said Yfandes, ale making her frank. "But you're level-headed and kind. You'll be a good king."

            "You said as much at my father's funeral, before the procession and the riot," said Restil.

            "Did I?"

            "You don't need to say it again. Tonight is... if it's about anyone it's Gala, but if it's about anyone living, it's about you, because you loved her so much. I... I feel like I've lost half an arm, because you both made such a good team. And you're senior Heralds, I... I was going to get Gala to teach, she was so good with the young Heralds." Restil buried his head in his hands.

            "We'll manage," said Yfandes. "I'll do the teaching. I'm not much use in the field, after all."

            "You killed two mages in front of me, I'd say that's pretty good in the field," said Restil. "And what about that... that empathy blast, or whatever it is? That's a new weapon for your arsenal."

            When Yfandes had overpowered Korwynnel—and everyone else—with the full brunt of her grief it had felt like something so raw and primal, she didn't know if she could do it again. Still, Restil thought she had great value, and if her king believed it, then she did too. Yfandes wrapped an arm around Restil, a thank you, for reassurance, to make herself feel better. "You're a good lad," she muttered into his hair.                               

            She woke the next morning still on the bank above the river, wet with dew. Vulf and Steladar lay around Yfandes and Restil, having kept them warm through the night. She laughed hoarsely until Restil woke up too.

            "Here's the king," said Yfandes, wheezing, "with grass in his hair, stinking of alcohol and horse!"

            "I hate everyone," muttered Restil, holding his head.

            Together, flanked by their Companions, they walked slowly back to the palace and back to their duty.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This is not the end! 
> 
> The follow-up fic will explore Yfandes and Gala in the LHM timeline, so stay tuned.


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